General Sir Thomas Cecil Hook Pearson, KCB, CBE, DSO & Bar (1 July 1914 – 15 December 2019) was a senior officer of the British Army who served as Commander-in-Chief of Allied Forces Northern Europe from 1972 to 1974.
His great-great-grandfather John Pearson (1771–1841) was a barrister and senior East India Company official who served as Advocate-General of Bengal from 1824 to 1840.
[3] His great-grandfather General Thomas Hooke Pearson CB (1806–1892) served as an ADC to the Earl Amherst, then Governor-General of India.
[3] His grandfather, Admiral Sir Hugo Pearson KCB (1843–1912) joined the Royal Navy and rose to command the Australia Station,[3] before retiring as Commander-in-Chief, The Nore in 1907.
[5] Pearson was educated at Charterhouse School,[6] and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, from where he, along with another future general officer, Douglas Darling, was commissioned as a second lieutenant into the Rifle Brigade (The Prince Consort's Own) on 30 August 1934.
[10] He was promoted to captain on 30 August 1942 and became Commanding Officer of 2nd Battalion Rifle Brigade that year, with the ranks of war substantive major and temporary lieutenant colonel.
[19] He was appointed Chief of Staff to the Director of Operations in Cyprus in 1960 and Head of the British Military Mission to the Soviet Zone of Germany in 1960.